Europe: The New Totalitarians

Germany's governing coalition of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Social Democratic Party (SPD), increasingly desperate to cling to power as the Alternative for Germany (AfD) continues to gain ground them in the polls, is becoming increasingly totalitarian.

For starters, Chancellor Friedrich Merz has made it clear that he wants to put an end to anonymity on the internet.

"I want to see real names on the internet. I want to know who is speaking," Merz said back in February. "In politics, we engage in debates in our society using our real names and without masks."

In other words, Merz wants the government and the big tech companies to know exactly who is behind every single comment, tweet, and meme on the internet.

Internet anonymity makes it harder to arrest people for speech that is deemed inconvenient—such as "hate speech" and "insults" -- and Germany's police have been raiding the homes of such internet users for years. Merz himself has filed hundreds of criminal complaints against ordinary German citizens perceived to have insulted him online, including against a 71-year-old retiree who committed the unconscionable crime of calling him "Pinocchio" on Facebook, and others who called him "Lügenfritz" ("Lying Fritz") and "Lackaffe" (a poseur or slick monkey).

Insulting a politician is considered a particularly heinous crime in Germany—it carries a sentence of up to three years in prison or a fine. The German police have entire specialized departments whose task is to scour the internet to detect people who dare to insult the Great German Leader or engage in other objectionable speech.

It appears that the end of internet anonymity in Germany may be fast approaching. On October 14, the government officially approved a policy framework establishing a roadmap to block children under 13 from major social media networks. This ban, however, would most likely make it impossible for anyone to access social media without first identifying themselves. The most logical outcome will be identification via a "Digital ID," which the European Union has required that every member country implement by the end of 2026.

The desire to see an end to internet anonymity is widespread among European governments. The European Commission itself is currently working on a bill, known as the EU KIDS Act, that will ban social media for teenagers under a certain age, "to restrict social media platforms' access to children in the EU." Combined with the Digital ID, it is the easiest path to ending anonymity on the internet. It may not happen immediately, but the EU is barreling toward that goal.

Meanwhile, in the United Kingdom, the totalitarian trend has become just as strong, if not worse. The government has been making examples of citizens who protest mass migration, which has continued across the UK's open borders. Most recently, Daniel Thomas, known as Danny Tommo, was arrested for criminal damage after he slashed an inflatable dinghy at sea—the kind of boat used by illegal migrants to arrive. The government did not simply arrest him, but locked him in prison and refused to release him on bail until his trial 17 months from now—in March 2027.

By contrast, the men who were arrested on September 27 for what is believed to have been an Iranian-orchestrated attempted attack on England's RAF Fairford air base—used by U.S. warplanes to carry out strikes on Iran— were all released on bail the next day. Then again, the UK government has released more than 70,000 criminals early since 2024 as part of the Labour government's plan to "combat prison overcrowding." So far, since their release, a third of those released have committed new crimes. One man sexually assaulted a woman the day he was released. Some of the victims of the criminals released early have fled the country.

"The early release program is necessary because without it, prisons would become so overcrowded that the police would be unable to make arrests" stated Jake Richards, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Sentencing. "Without intervention, we risk running out of prison space, leaving courts unable to sentence offenders and the police unable to make arrests."

The space they are eager to create in prisons seems to be for ordinary citizens who are fed up with how their country is run and had the nerve to speak out. That is how it works in totalitarian systems. Criminals are released so that dissidents can take their places. In addition to Tommo, a man was recently arrested for protesting the arrival of a large dinghy carrying illegal immigrants by throwing a small empty plastic bottle into the air at a police line and then shouting "f--k off" at them. For this outrage, he was arrested; his case was processed through the justice system at record speed, and he was sentenced to two years in prison without parole.

"Throwing a plastic bottle is simply a way to provoke others into action. He lobbed it in that general direction. "He's throwing something," the judge ruled.

"It is important to distinguish between the right to peaceful protest and criminal offenses that occur when people cease to protest peacefully. Many of them were wearing face coverings, which added to the atmosphere of intimidation. The impact of that night's violence on the community has been profound.... This offense is so serious that the only appropriate punishment is immediate imprisonment."

You don't say.

Over the course of three years of pro-Hamas protests inciting violence by calling for a "global intifada" and "the intifada revolution is the only solution" on the streets of Britain—not a single protester even came close to receiving that kind of sentence, even though Hamas is a banned terrorist organization in the UK. Protesters who wore the Hamas paraglider symbol or the Hamas headband were convicted of terrorism offenses but acquitted by sympathetic judges and never served any time in prison.

Judge Tan Ikram told the three women who used the paraglider symbols:

"You crossed the line, but it would have been fair to say that emotions ran very high on this issue. You have learned your lesson well. I do not believe you were trying to show any support for Hamas."

It is evidently acceptable to get carried away by emotions in support of Hamas' mass slaughter, dismemberment and rape of Jews. The judge even seems to be saying that their view is understandable, not a sign of support for terrorism. When it comes to trying to protect your family from predatory illegal male migrants from the Third World arriving by the thousands on your country's shores, that is not acceptable.

"The offense in this case was that Mr. Hajsaad wore a bandana at a demonstration," Judge Nina Tempia ruled in a case involving a Hamas headband.

"With regard to harm, I agree with the prosecution that harm was caused because the conduct was linked to support for a proscribed organization. The offense was committed after (the October 7 attacks). Not days or weeks later, but seven weeks later. I would not classify the harm as serious." The terrorist supporter was spared both prison and fines "because of his 'extremely limited budget' of £49 per week, which he used for food and travel."

This seems to be how the UK "justice" system works. If you support Hamas, a terrorist organization, it is considered either not real support at all, or not likely to cause "serious harm." Instead, protesting illegal immigration must be immediately punished with unconditional prison sentences. If this isn't an example of the state emboldening terrorism, it would be hard to say what is.

When ordinary citizens are imprisoned for standing up for the safety of their families and their country, while supporters of terrorists are coddled, you know that your country is being ruled by what the late Polish psychiatrist Andrzej Łobaczewski, in his book *Political Ponerology: The Science of Evil, Psychopathy, and the Origins of Totalitarianism, called them: "psychopaths."

Robert Williams is based in the United States.

© Gatestone Institute.